


Never Quite as It Seems

by MinaSark



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, Damerey Daily, F/M, Late Night Conversations, Post TLJ, Pre-Relationship, pre-tros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-06
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:09:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22591543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MinaSark/pseuds/MinaSark
Summary: Of all the former Rebellion bases the Resistance had repurposed as they gathered supplies and grew their numbers in the month after Crait, Hoth’s base was—by far—Rey's least favorite. As it turned out, she did not particularly enjoy being cold.That was the worst thing about being on the frozen planet, Rey decided. Well, that and the incredibly weird dreams she’d been having in the two weeks since they had made Hoth their temporary home.“So…what brings you to the mess hall at this ungodly hour? It can’t be for the caf.” Poe asked, nodding at her untouched beverage.“I…” She began, trying to figure out how to explain the dream that had woken her up that night—the most vivid one that she’d had since she had first stepped foot on Hoth.She wasn’t even sure whether or not she could explain her dream.For the Damerey Daily 2020 prompt: "They’re fascinating. It’s like being inside a dream or something. There’s truth but no logic."
Relationships: Poe Dameron & Rey, Poe Dameron/Rey
Comments: 14
Kudos: 100





	Never Quite as It Seems

**Author's Note:**

> This fic brought to you by cold midwestern winters, too much coffee, and the Cranberries on endless loop.
> 
> Title from: "Dreams" by The Cranberries

Rey slowly shuffled down the hall, not quite fully awake as she made her way towards the Resistance base’s mess hall. She knew that third shift always kept a large pot of caf on stasis during those long night watches and while the beverage would not aid in her going back to sleep, it was at least warm.

Besides, Rey thought groggily, sleep was more or less a lost cause at that point.

Of all the former Rebellion bases the Resistance had repurposed as they gathered supplies and grew their numbers in the month after Crait, Hoth’s base was—by far—her least favorite.

As it turned out, Rey did not particularly enjoy being cold.

Upon entering the cafeteria, Rey headed straight for the back and made quick work of pouring the hot beverage into one of the mugs that were stacked in a neat little pyramid next to the brewing machine. She clutched the cup close to her chest, sighing in contentment as the steam slowly drifted up, warming her face.

After spending her entire life on Jakku, Rey had thought space was freezing, but it was _nothing_ compared to the bite that not even the base’s temperature control could completely remove from the air. She was currently wearing three pairs of socks, two pairs of leggings, a long sleeved undershirt, and an over-sized knitted sweater that she had managed to find in an abandoned supply closet when they’d first arrived. Rey suspected that the forgotten ratty sweater was originally for a larger male, but the garment had quickly become her favorite possession on Hoth. It was like wearing a blanket.

But despite all her layering, however, her nose was _always_ cold.

That was the worst thing about being on the frozen planet, Rey decided as the steam from the caf slowly gave feeling back to her face.

Well, that and the _incredibly_ weird dreams she’d been having in the two weeks since they had made Hoth their temporary home. She was used to nightmares, but these new dreams were something else altogether. Something she had been avoiding thinking about since she’d started having them. They were almost too strange to comprehend—so far removed from her current circumstances to even entertain the idea of them being anything other than an overactive imagination.

And yet, they felt so _real_...

“Caf at 0300?”

Her eyes snapped open and she slowly turned to face the owner of the voice she hadn’t heard in over seven days.

“You’re back!” She exclaimed, giving Poe a tight smile, still too cold for her facial muscles to do much of anything. She had been so focused on acquiring the caf that she failed to realize she wasn’t the only one in the mess.

Poe gave her a weary nod, “Just returned about twenty minutes ago.”

“How did it go?” She asked, taking a tentative step forward. As much as she would like to sit and catch up with the pilot, she of all people knew how rare alone time was to come by on base. The last thing she wanted to do was encroach on what had previously been her friend’s private moment.

Poe gave a rather dramatic sigh and gestured for Rey to sit at the table across from him and her smile grew.

“That well, huh?”

He flashed her an unamused look as she took her seat, but the small tug at the corner of his mouth gave him away. It always gave him away during their back and forths that Rey had grown rather fond of that as heated as they could get, never contained any malice. Poe Dameron smiled freely, even when he was cross with her, and Rey found it hard not to smile back. Even when she was cross with _him_.

But as time stretched on and the intel they received turned more and more dire, he smiled less. Even as Rey sat across from him, she could tell that Poe Dameron hadn't smiled in the seven days since she had seen him.

“That well.” He agreed with a groan, “We visited three systems and only one gave us even the slightest hint that they would even consider giving the Resistance support.”

“That’s better than nothing.” Rey commented with a shrug.

Poe looked down at his own half empty cup of caf, his expression thoughtful, “I suppose it is.”

They sat in comfortable silence for a moment as Rey shifted her mug in her hands, sighing in contentment as she leeched the warmth from the cup through her fingers. 

“So…what brings you to the mess hall at this ungodly hour? It can’t be for the caf.” He asked, nodding at her untouched beverage.

“I…” She began, trying to figure out how to explain the dream that had woken her up that night—the most vivid one that she’d had since she had first stepped foot on Hoth.

She wasn’t even sure whether or not she _could_ explain her dream.

Poe’s expression softened as he watched her debate whether or not to tell him, “Nightmare?”

“Not exactly.” Rey replied, feeling her cheeks warm for a reason she didn’t quite understand.

It wasn’t all that uncommon for them to run into each other at all hours of the night on base after one (or both) of them woke up from a particularly nasty dream—a result from torture that they were both all too familiar with. It was one of the first things that had bonded them as friends, Poe going so far as to jokingly call them “torture buddies,” though both knew that it was a club to which neither of them wanted to belong. They’d talked about far more serious things during those nights when sleep had previously eluded them—she’d even cried in his arms on more than one occasion—so she wasn’t quite sure why she was struggling so much in that moment to string together a coherent sentence.

Poe, nice guy that he was, didn’t press—which only made Rey want to tell him more.

Maybe he could help her make sense of what she had seen.

“I…” She began again, searching for the right words before landing on answering his question with one of her own, “Have you ever…thought about the future?”

“Of course.” Poe replied automatically, taking a small sip from his cup.

Rey shook her head, gripping her mug a little tighter, “No, I mean about what life will be like _after_ the war is over.”

He considered this for a moment before he gave an answer, “Not until recently.”

There was something in his voice the Rey couldn’t place, but she continued, “My life on Jakku…well, you saw it.”

Poe nodded, no doubt remembering the time a few months prior that they had traveled to Jakku to acquire some Imperial parts from one of the wasted star destroyers in the Graveyard. It was a successful scavenging mission that resulted in Rose being able to recreate the Imperial tech which allowed the Resistance to be able to mask their ships’ signatures from First Order detection. Poe had gone with Rey to collect the parts and had gotten a firsthand view of what her daily routine had been for over a decade.

To his credit, Poe did not comment on how bleak it all had been—Rey’s life back when it was all she could do to survive. If anything, the remarks he did make were ones of admiration, asking her thoughtful questions about the things she had built when he had first seen her workstation and marveling at the fact that she had built a vaperator from scratch. He even went so far as to say that her circuit times on the flight simulator she had rigged in her AT-AT-turned-home rivaled his own from his academy days.

He’d made returning to her old life bearable—until they got caught in a sandstorm that lasted nearly three days and tested the unwavering optimism that Poe Dameron was known for. At that point after their thirtieth game of sabacc, even he had to admit that her living situation had been pretty grim.

“The only thing I ever looked forward to was the hope that maybe one day my family would come back for me. I never thought…” she paused, her voice hitching before she said the next part.

“…I never considered that I could start one of my own.”

When she looked up, she found that Poe’s expression had become completely unreadable.

His posture was also incredibly tense.

Strange.

“And is that…something you want?” he asked, his voice clipped.

Cautious.

He was acting almost as oddly as she felt in that moment and Rey was fairly certain her face was on fire—a feeling that should have given her comfort after days of feeling near frozen, but definitely did not. She had the urge to bolt, but she was too far in to turn back now. Besides, she sensed no mockery in his Force signature. Only curiosity.

And…hope?

“I don’t know.” She admitted, looking back down at her mug trying to make sense of her own feelings not to mention what she was gleaning off Poe, “It’s such a strange thing to think about. Besides…I don’t think this war will be over for a while.”

“That didn’t stop my parents.” Poe replied, his voice still a little wary, “They met during the early days of the Rebellion, had me two years before the war even ended.”

Rey tried to imagine Poe as a little child in the middle of an active military base, “That had to have been hard. On everyone.”

“It was.” He agreed, “But they were happy. Sometimes you just have to hold onto happiness wherever you find it. War or no war.”

The two fell into another companionable silence before Poe began to fiddle with his mug, batting it back and forth between his hands, “So this dream future of yours. What was it like?”

“Well, I was on a warmer planet, for starters.” Rey joked, earning a rueful look from her friend.

She chuckled for a moment before she continued, thinking back to all that she had seen, “I was in a house, an actual house and it was…mine.”

Her smile was soft as she remembered how she had felt in her dream, surrounded by so much space yet feeling such comfort. Such peace. 

The best part about the house— _her house_ —was that it had been flooded with light from the large windows that were spaced evenly throughout the main room—a living room, she thought they were called. A fitting name for such a space, she thought as she remembered how she had stood in front of one of the windows, staring out at the foreign environment that was her home.

“Everything just felt so…green.” She continued, “The house was surrounded by trees, but they were unlike any trees I’ve ever seen before.”

“How so?” Poe asked, looking genuinely interested in her answer. Having grown up on a jungle moon, he enjoyed green things just as much as she did.

“They were massive. Just so incredibly _tall_. Much taller than the ones on Takodana.” She stared down at her mug, scrunching her nose in thought, “But then there were these other trees. I don’t quite know how to describe it…but they were smaller and they grew in rows. I don’t think they were a forest—it was like…” she paused searching for the right way to describe what she had seen, “…they were purposefully planted in straight lines.”

She looked at Poe, “Does that make sense?”

“It sounds like you saw an orchard.” He commented.

 _Orchard_ , Rey thought as the rightness of the word washed over her. She remembered liking that particular window—the second one from the front right corner of the living room because she could _see the orchard_.

“Would that mean I lived on a farm?” She asked, genuinely curious about what living so close to an orchard meant.

“Sounds like you might.” Poe confirmed with a nod.

Rey sat there deep in thought, completely missing the intensity of her friend’s stare.

“Is that a problem?” he asked hesitantly.

“No.” she answered, “It’s just…I’ve never been on a farm before.”

The admission caused the corner of Poe's mouth to twitch once more.

“So you retire and become a farmer.” he stated thinking over all that she had said to him, “Your Jedi powers will come in handy during the harvest season.”

Rey laughed as Poe wiggled his fingers at her teasingly. She knew that Poe had grown up on a farm during the countless hours of downtime they’d spent in the cockpit of the Falcon sharing stories. Based on what she remembered from those conversations, she thought she would quite like living on a farm. Especially since…

She felt her cheeks flush as she remembered the final detail of her dream.

The part that had caused her to wake up from the shock of it.

Poe’s brows furrowed in concern.

“What is it?” he asked.

“I think…” She paused, clearing her throat nervously before starting again, “I think in my dream I was...married.”

Poe just looked at her in disbelief.

“You think?” 

“Well, I had a ring on my finger.” She explained as she held up her left hand, suddenly nervous. Had she misspoken? Was that why Poe was looking at her like that?

“That…that means you’re married to someone, right?” she asked, “Like Snap and Kare?”

“Yeah, it generally does.” Poe replied as he took a sip from his mug.

Rey watched him wondering how someone could look so calm when their Force signature was all over the place. Poe had never really been one to hide his emotions which was why his countenance during this entire conversation was so baffling to her.

“So…” he started, as he carefully set his mug back down on the table, “who was the lucky person?”

“I don’t know. I never saw him.” She answered truthfully, which, oddly enough, caused Poe to relax a little.

“But the ring was gorgeous.” She added with a smile.

Poe smirked as he leaned back in his chair, “Let me guess…gold band studded with colorful gemstones from all parts of the galaxy.”

“No, actually.” She chuckled, imagining the flashy ring that Poe had described and grimacing, “It was just a silver band, but when I looked at it, it was like I could feel the significance of it.”

She looked back down at her hand and missed the anguish on her friend's face.

“I remember thinking it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.” She continued, smiling to herself, “That I was happy. That whoever it was who had given it to me made me happy.”

It was quiet for a moment before Poe cleared his throat.

“That sounds…like a very detailed dream.” He replied, adopting that careful tone of his once more.

“But that’s just it!” Rey exclaimed, “It wasn’t clear like my dreams usually are…or my nightmares are for that matter. It was more like…really vivid flashes. There was truth to it, but no logic. Almost like…”

Rey abruptly stopped before she could finish her sentence.

_Almost like a Force vision._

The unspoken words hung between the two of them and Rey had no doubt in her mind that Poe knew what she had nearly said. After all, she’d told him about some of her visions before—sometimes it was the only reliable intel they had on a mission—but Rey was hesitant to say the words aloud in this instance because it would make them real.

Which made no sense.

The Force wouldn’t waste time showing Rey visions of domesticity, would it? Not when her previous visions had been so consequential.

Then again, every time she thought back on her most recent dreams, she felt that similar sensation that what she had seen was important.

That it was destiny.

“Poe?” she asked, her eyes moving from her hand to meet his gaze. This time, she did not miss the intensity found within it.

“Yeah?”

For the first time since she had stepped foot on that frozen planet, she felt entirely too warm.

“What do you think of when you think of the future?”

Poe let out a shaky laugh looking impossibly tired as he glanced down to examine his now empty mug.

“Nothing as good as what your future sounds like.”

She nudged her untouched caf across the table, “Try me.”

“I hadn’t really thought about it until recently.” He admitted, grabbing her mug with a nod of thanks, “A part of me always thought…”

He paused, almost looking pained over what he was about to say next.

“I guess a part of me always thought that I wouldn’t see the end of all this. And I was okay with that.” He added when he saw her shocked expression, “I had made my peace with it. But…”

“But…” Rey prompted, reaching out for his hand.

He flipped his hand over, lacing his fingers with hers and Rey couldn’t help but notice that holding his hand warmed hers up faster than clutching any cup of caf ever had.

“Lately, I’ve been thinking about how nice it would be to head back to Yavin IV. Maybe even take over my dad’s koyo farm.” He downed the lukewarm caf in one gulp before setting the mug back on the table with a sardonic laugh, “Maker, if my teenage-self heard me say that, he would die of shock.”

“Perhaps our farms will be next to one another.” Rey suggested, “If you’re nice, I’ll even agree to help you during harvest season.”

Rey lifted her free hand, wiggling her fingers back at Poe, who simply grinned in response—his first full smile since he and Rey had started talking.

“I’d like that.”

She gave his hand a squeeze, “Me too.”

**Author's Note:**

> As a side note, I do have that side mission to Jakku partly written if anyone is interested to see these two in a warmer climate...


End file.
